Assistant Headteacher

Job description

Position: Assistant Headteacher

Salary:L12-16 (£74,702-81,577) Inner London pay scale

Hours of work: Full Time

Contract Term: Permanent

Closing Date: Midday, Monday 19 May

Interviews: Wednesday/Thursday 21/22 May

Shortlisting: Monday 19 May, pm

Start date : 1st  September 2025

About Riverside

We are a successful co-educational maintained secondary special school based in Haringey in North London. We provide 175 places for students, mainly from across the borough.

We are always mindful that we need to deliver positive outcomes for all, according to our motto: ‘Learning to Live Life to the Full.’  We aim to nurture and develop happy and fulfilled students whilst ensuring that they have the highest possible levels of independence before they move on to post-16/post-19 education/care and later adult life.

The school is co-located with a mainstream secondary school, Mulberry Academy at Woodside, which enables a range of inclusive activities to take place between the schools.

The vacant post

This post has become vacant following our current postholder moving on to a new specialist provision. We aim to appoint an innovative, committed, and talented Assistant Head to work closely with our Headteacher, Deputy Head and substantive Assistant Head in jointly leading the school forward on our journey of continuing improvement from a strong base.

Organisation of the school

Students at Riverside experience a wide range of learning challenges, from the most cognitively able to the most complex, including general, moderate, complex, severe, and profound and multiple learning difficulties. Approximately two-thirds of our population have a diagnosis of autism.

Classes are organised into teams, with each team containing 3-5 classes, organised according to common levels of independence, communication styles and level of learning needs, divided by key stage rather than year group:

Team 1: MLD (11-16, KS3/4)                Progress 8+, formal curriculum

Team 2: SLD (11-16, KS3/4)                  Progress 8+/8, adapted curriculum

Team 3: SLD (11-16, KS3/4)                  Sensory Progress 8

Team 4: SLD/PMLD (11-19, KS3/4/5)  Developmental 8

Team 5: MLD/SLD (16-19, KS5)            Specialised multi-dimensional curriculum

Class teachers deliver English, maths, science, PSHEE. Specialist teachers deliver art, music, PE, and food technology, (also computing with the Progress 8+ classes).

At KS4 all students take a range of fully accredited courses according to their capacity. The majority of students transition to college at year 11, but a small cohort stay on at Riverside for their Post-16 years where they also take a range of accredited courses, transitioning then to Post-19 provisions.

Our achievements

OFSTED INSPECTION – April 2022

Overall effectiveness: Good     The quality of education: Good     Behaviour and attitudes: Outstanding Personal development: Outstanding     Leadership and management: Good     Sixth-form provision: Good

• ‘Pupils and staff enjoy first-rate, trusting relationships. Staff are experts at managing pupils’

       behaviours. They do so with consistency.’

• ‘Staff promote a love of reading by using a range of class texts in lessons and by reading to all pupils.

                     This includes pupils with profound needs. Staff make learning fun and engaging.’

• ‘The school has an effective careers information, education, advice, and guidance programme. Pupils

                    take part in work experience. Year 11 pupils are engaged in a school business enterprise of car-washing’.

• ‘The school has an extensive programme for pupils’ enrichment outside the classroom. It makes a

                     wonderful contribution to pupil’s personal development.’

• ‘Pupils take part in joint projects with overseas schools. They also visit museums, participate in a

                    Shakespeare arts festival and enter art competitions.’

NAS (NATIONAL AUTISTIC SOCIETY) CERTIFICATE OF QUALITY AUTISM PROVISION – May 2024

• ‘Autistic students are treated with dignity, status and respect and are provided with meaningful positive feedback to boost confidence, self- esteem, and self-worth. Precise and genuine praise was ’
• ‘Each autistic student is supported to socially interact with peers during Many observed lessons involved students being supported to take part in structured and purposeful social skills activities.’
• ‘Excellent lessons were observed where students learned about relationships through a story supported by relevant props to learn about ’
• ‘Staff are confident in talking about how they support autistic Staff gave examples of students participating and performing at the Shakespeare festival.’
• ‘Staff provide the right level of support to enable each autistic student to experience a sense of completion and success whilst helping them develop skills of self-reliance and resilience.’

What we offer

Becoming an Assistant Headteacher at Riverside means joining a busy, vibrant, and caring community, working closely with an experienced Headteacher, and loyal and supportive staff and governors, all determined to achieve positive outcomes for students.

The school is surrounded by green spaces, and there is free on-site staff parking and excellent transport links for buses, and underground and overground trains. Please take a look at our website for full details about our school, in particular our School Offer which summarises all features of our provision.

Interested applicants

We would ask that all applicants complete the attached HARINGEY application form.

Visits: Interested applicants may wish to visit the school by individual appointment prior to the closing date. Appointments can be made through contacting Angela Johnney via email: angelaj@riverside.haringey.sch.uk

On appointment: Please note that we are currently restructuring our LT/SMT areas of responsibility, so that the newly appointed Assistant Head may find that some elements of the job description may have changed.